


Not Part Of The Job Description

by fififolle, rain_sleet_snow



Series: A Question Of Trust [1]
Category: Primeval
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-02-05
Updated: 2010-02-05
Packaged: 2018-03-10 16:22:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3296882
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fififolle/pseuds/fififolle, https://archiveofourown.org/users/rain_sleet_snow/pseuds/rain_sleet_snow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Blade and Lorraine weren’t much for arguing- so when they did, it hurt.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not Part Of The Job Description

**Author's Note:**

> Part of a collaboration with fififolle; we each wrote three fics in alternating sequence and then beta'd each other's work.

Blade was early. This was not normal.

 

They generally left the office together now, and returned to Lorraine’s flat; Ross complained that Lorraine was throwing off their washing-up rota, and Lorraine had laughed at him and said that if the state of their kitchen last time she’d seen it was anything to go by, the washing-up rota consisted of Blade and Rees blitzing the lot whenever they felt it was too unsanitary. Blade was seeing increasingly little of his own room.

 

Most days, Lorraine was convinced that it was a good thing. Having a set time to be ready to leave the office – eight o’clock, barring all dinosaurs and national emergencies – helped stop her working herself to death, and she was ready to admit that she was much happier when Blade was around. Still, most days Blade wasn’t leaning against the doorjamb, watching her wrap up her work rather hastily, an ill-concealed sullenness and anger in the lines of his mouth and his flat green eyes. That worried Lorraine and irritated her in equal measures, and as she switched her computer off, seized her handbag and two folders and turned out the lights in the office, Blade was heading down the ramp.

 

Puzzled and annoyed, Lorraine followed him at a relatively sedate pace. He wasn’t going anywhere; she was the one with the car keys. What was wrong with him? It was only a quarter to eight, and the team and soldiers had come back from their latest jaunt just ten minutes ago.

 

Eventually, she reached the car park and found her car. Blade was leaning against it, arms folded, eyes staring blankly ahead with an alarmingly fierce concentration. She stepped up to him and touched his shoulder; he flinched, and she drew her hand away and stood back, almost insulted.

 

“What’s wrong, Niall?” she asked.

 

“I’ll tell you later,” he said, biting out the words, and turned and reached out for her with his other arm, pulling her close against him and holding her tightly, almost too tightly. Some part of her noticed that he still smelt like his showergel, and his hair was still damp; also that he was wearing a clean change of clothes, and being cautious with the arm she’d tried to touch. She hugged him back, trying to calm him; was he looking for comfort? Had something happened? He didn’t relax.

 

“Bloody useless,” he said suddenly, venomously, and let her go. “Let’s go.”

 

Disturbed, Lorraine unlocked the car and went round to the driver’s seat, putting her handbag in the back seat and starting the car. The drive home was uneventful and silent; Blade simmered in the passenger seat, and she worried, but said nothing. Even once she’d parked, and they were walking up to her flat, he refused to speak and hardly looked at her. He walked too fast, as well; she had to struggle to keep up with him.

 

In short, Lorraine was uneasy, and growing more so. Opening her door, she let Blade in and followed him, putting her handbag and files down on the sofa and going to the sink to get a drink of water. “Do you want some?” she offered, holding out the glass, and he stalked towards her and took the glass from her, sipping from it for a moment before giving it back. She finished it off, and rinsed the glass out.

 

He was running bad-temperedly through the cupboards, pulling out salt and pepper, olive oil, potatoes. “Hey, wait,” Lorraine said, alarmed. “I thought it was my turn to cook?” She gently removed a packet of large tomatoes from his hands. “I could cook, and you could tell me what’s got you so worked up?”

 

Blade looked reluctant, but relinquished control of the kitchen worktop and moved away, pacing crossly.

 

“Is it bad?” she tried, fishing through the contents of her spice rack and rediscovering the garlic crusher.

 

“Bad?” Blade said explosively.

 

“Yes, then,” Lorraine murmured, frowning. “A new issue?”

 

He shook his head. “No. This has been going on for a while.”

 

“What has? You’re worrying me now. I should know about it, if it’s like that.”

 

“You do. It’s the baby captain again. He can’t- he’s-“ Blade seemed to be editing his sentences as he went, taking out the profanities, and from the way his fists clenched it was giving him considerable trouble. “He’s bloody useless!”

 

Oh, _that_ , Lorraine thought, not without frustration. Yes, that certainly counted as an ongoing issue. Poor Captain Becker, he was facing a serious barrage of hostility and it wasn’t really his fault, it was just that he was new and young. He was capable; Lorraine had access to his files, and had read them from cover to cover. She was aware, too, that he hadn’t been able to choose his squad, and had been landed with three good soldiers and a collection of genuinely incompetent idiots – a fact most of Ryan’s men refused to take into account.

 

“What now?” she asked wearily, turning from where she was briskly chopping chicken breast, and was startled to see her boyfriend pulling off his shirt. “Niall…Oh, my God!”

 

Vivid bruising and scrapes coloured his left arm from wrist to shoulder, creeping up towards the collarbone. Ditzy had applied some kind of analgesic cream and antiseptic and had covered the worst scrapes, but most were visible, and looked very painful. Lorraine knew full well it wasn’t the worst injury Blade had ever had, but it certainly looked impressive. “Bloody hell, that looks like it hurts,” she murmured, putting down the knife, washing her hands quickly and going over to Blade to examine the damage better. “Where did you get that?”

 

“Today’s wild-goose chase,” Blade said bitterly, holding the arm out for inspection. “Babyface mucked up the communications again, so we didn’t know there was a- not a dinosaur, some kind of huge... Connor called it a calico something, coming at us until there bloody well was! I got swiped into a tree. Finn’s concussed. Kermit nearly broke his neck. Fiver had his foot crushed.”

 

“I thought anomalies fouled up communications naturally?” Lorraine pointed out delicately, returning to her meal in progress.

 

“Yeah, so he should have arranged it better! He should know to do that by now!”

 

“Did he have a choice?”

 

“Yes! He had the numbers for a better strategy!”

 

“Competent numbers?” Lorraine said sceptically.

 

“What?”  


“I deal with Lieutenant Dawson on a day-to-day basis. I wouldn’t trust him further than I could throw him. If Becker had to put men like that in c-“

 

“What the _fuck_ do you know about it?” Blade snapped.

 

Lorraine gaped at him.

 

“Don’t you lecture _me_ on-“

 

“I’m not lecturing you, I-“ she tried.

 

“Shut up! You don’t know what-“  


“Forgive me for having a brain in my head!”

 

“-got no clue-“

 

“-how stupid do I look-“

 

“How long have I been doing this job, anyway?! Don’t you think that makes me-“

 

“I’ve met more objective UKIP candidates! You can’t judge!”

 

“You think _you_ can?” he demanded, voice laden with scorn.

 

“Yes! Actually! You don’t watch this all the time, you don’t see it. You _want_ Becker to be a bad commanding officer, you _want_ to find fault with him. Don’t think I haven’t noticed the way you treat him just because he isn’t Ryan! That’s not his fault! I mean- honestly, Niall, how childish can you get?” she cried.

 

“Childish? For fuck’s sake! It’s none of your fucking business anyway!” he shouted.

 

“Don’t you talk to me like that! And I’m sorry, how is it not my business? I deal with this kind of thing all the time!”

 

“That’s not your _job_! That’s just something you’ve taken on because you can never say no to anyone! It’s like you want to kill yourself with work or something, so you stick your nose into other people’s business and find things to do there!”

 

She stared at him, ashen, her heart thudding. He was white as a sheet under the semi-permanent tan, eyes ablaze, glaring back, and after a second a look entered his eyes, almost of anger at her for being upset. She turned away, and he left; numb, she listened to the bang of a slammed door and the thud-clatter of quick, heavy footsteps.

 

When she crossed to the window she saw him leaving, his shirt back on now, vanishing down the street, walking fast. And then he rounded the corner and was gone. If he was planning on walking to Hammersmith and the house he shared with Matt, Ross and Finn, she wished him luck.

 

The rain clouds overhead, restless and filled with heavy summer rain, split and poured down onto the streets of London. Lorraine sighed, and leaned her forehead against the cool glass.

 

His words reeled in her head, cruel and unavoidable, and she had an inexplicable sense of something sliding through her fingers to fall away, lost, and she clutched at it, trying to keep hold, and felt it still slip away.

 

That night she did not dream, and that was because she did not sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Link to the next part, by fififolle. http://fififolle.livejournal.com/186310.html


End file.
